Confirmation came in the evening directly from Vercelli Police Headquarters: police arrested the manager of Cid spa di Saluggia – the Italian branch of the Turkish multinational company Alvimedica SY, a leader in the production of biomedical devices -, in the execution of an international warrant issued by a Turkish court. The man, Ahmet Özcan, has been on the run since last February when he was officially charged in his homeland with crimes of fraud against the group he worked for, as well as money laundering.
According to the company’s founding family, aided in Italy by Dla Piper, Ozcan created off-balance sheet funds totaling more than 65 million dollars as a result of a sophisticated fraud carried out, according to investigators, through a maze of selling the company with promises – not kept – to return it to its owners.
According to investigative documents, in 2023, in order to get out of debt of several group companies, Özcan convinced the owners of the holding companies of the need to continue the financial restructuring of the entire group. The plan envisages that the companies should be temporarily transferred to entities established in the Netherlands, and then demoted once the reorganization is complete and a hypothetical stock market listing begins.
However, those plans would be drastically halted if the manager fled after the indictment at home, even if his passport was revoked simultaneously. Extradition procedures to hand him over to a Turkish court have been initiated and will be carried out, according to Police Headquarters Vercelli, in the next few hours.
The company is part of the Saluggia biomedical district and employs about 200 people. Last year the union had mobilized following the disappearance of a missing manager following a legal case involving him.
